The Fairfax County Board of Supervisors is threatening to stall a crucial vote on funding for the Dulles rail until it sees contract documents that have up until now been tightly held by state and airports authority officials.
The threat came from Chairman Gerald Connolly at an hours-long public briefing Monday morning intended to lay out details of the planned expansion of Metro. The briefing was held only two weeks before a planned June 18 vote on whether the board will approve $400 million for the project’s first 11.6-mile phase from West Falls Church to Wiehle Avenue.
“If you want this board to move, we’re going to have access to documents or we’re not going to move,” Connolly told Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority General Counsel Ed Faggen.
Faggen said his agency, which is slated to take over the project, will deliver contract information by the end of the week. MWAA itself has technically not yet voted to approve the contract with Bechtel Infrastructure and Washington Group International to design and build the project’s first phase. That vote is scheduled for Wednesday.
It’s unclear, however, how much of that agreement would be redacted to protect what MWAA and contractors feel is proprietary information.
Supervisors on Monday refused a proposal from Lee District Supervisor Dana Kauffman to postpone the June 18 vote outright and hold a public hearing in its stead. Kauffman’s proposal touched off a debate that mapped the boundaries of the controversy.
At issue is whether the board will commit to moving forward with a project with an aerial track through Tysons Corner that many residents strongly oppose. Pro-tunnel group Tysonstunnel.org is urging the board to essentially hold the funds ransom to force the state toreconsider an underground track and put the project out to bid. Opponents of that option say it would destroy the entire rail expansion.
“If we vote no, the project is dead, and the tunnel is dead with it,” Connolly said.
Gov. Tim Kaine nixed the tunnel last September after a warning that cost increases and delays would imperil federal money for the rail line. County staff on Monday delivered an equally grim assessment, arguing the tunnel plan is not as cheap or quick as proponents say it is.
“It’s a huge risk,” said Rick Stevens, Dulles rail coordinator for the Fairfax County Department of Transportation. “It’s a $900 million risk that nobody besides the federal government is willing to commit to this project.”
Tysonstunnel.org president Scott Monett disputed county staff’s assessment, arguing their information was derived from contractors interested in protecting “a sole source deal.”
